After responding to Tao's impatient and somewhat whiny- in a cute way, of course- text, Sehun hurried to pack up his belongings, dropping things in his haste to get out of there. He clattered down the stairs dangerously, and a teacher that he passed tried to admonish him, but Sehun swore nothing could hold him back now.

He nearly collided with the automatic doors at the front of college, because they didn’t open fast enough for him, then he sprinted round the back of the building, to meet up with Tao, who would be impatiently waiting for him at the car park exit. He couldn’t stop the grin that climbed onto his face and refused to leave at the prospect of seeing Tao, and he realised he probably looked a little stupid, with his bag hitting his leg noisily while was running, but he couldn't bring himself to care.

He reached their usual meeting point, and crouched over, hands on his knees, trying to get his breathing steady, before greeting him with a hug. But when he looked up, he wasn't there. Sehun huffed, and looked around, but he wasn't anywhere in sight. Hilarious. He'd been fretting about being murdered by some strange men before, so he was probably hiding, to get revenge for his lack of sympathy.

Where could he be hiding? Maybe behind the bushes? Sehun checked but there was nothing there. Leaning back around the edge of the brick wall, Sehun scanned the car park, but there were so few cars that he surely would’ve seen him on the way here. Where the hell was he?

“Tao? I get it now, I’m sorry. You can come out now.” He called out, still examining the area warily, in case he decided to jump out at him and scare him.

He waited another few minutes, becoming more and more worried by the second. This was really not funny now. He decided to phone him, so he could hear the ringtone and find him like that. The phone dialed, and Sehun raised the phone to his ear, eyes flitting around suspiciously. He heard his ringtone- some girl group song about electricity- coming from over by the wall, but he couldn’t see him. He must really have been hiding after all. He felt smug for having caught him out, but the ringtone continued blaring out across the empty car park. Sehun headed over to it, following the sound, but he just found his phone on the floor, the screen cracked.

He stopped the call and examined it, now extremely concerned. Upon unlocking it, he found a half composed message for him, which Tao never managed to send,

To Sehun

Seriously, these guys look really sca

And it ended there. Frantic, he called his dad, fingers shaking as he looked through the phonebook for his contact.

“Hey, dad? I think Tao been kidnapped or something, I just found his phone on the floor, and there’s and unfinished text to me, and I can’t find him anywhere, what the hell do I do?” Sehun cringed at how high his voice had gone. But in the grand scheme of things, what he sounded like didn't matter because Tao might be in danger.

“Wow, slow down. Say that again.” His dad sounded overwhelmed, which was understandable, but Sehun didn't have time to repeat himself over again when Tao was in trouble.

“I think Tao has been kidnapped!” He reiterated. He gripped his phone tightly in his clammy hand, images of him being attacked and beat up played through his mind like some kind of macabre cinematic he couldn’t push away.

“When did you last see him?” He asked, all brusque business now, and the sounds of paper being moved accompanied his word.

“I was texting him, like five minutes ago,” He told him, “and just now I found his phone on the floor and it's got a crack on it that wasn't there before so I think he must have dropped it, so that means there must have been a fight or something? I don't know what to do, dad.”

It took his dad nearly fifteen minutes to arrive, and when he did, he got out of his car and jogged up to meet Sehun, wrapping him up in a reassuring hug that he fell into gratefully,

“Are you ok?” He asked, rubbing a soothing hand up and down his back. Did he mean physically, or mentally? Because he was a mess inside right then, to be honest. He nodded anyway, not meeting his eyes in case he saw the tears that threatened to spill over. 

“I called Mr Evans, I think you’ve met him? He’s hopefully going to help us sort this mess out and get Tao back, ok?" 

Sehun had only met this guy once, back when he wasn’t allowed out of his house because his hormone implant had gone haywire. All he remembered was that he had floppy hair. That had been a long time ago, and after that they’d had to move to another part of the country. But that was only the first time, after that they'd moved nearly every year, but he'd been home-schooled so he didn’t understand that it was for his own good.

“How is Mr Evans going to help?” Sehun asked him, “I thought he was just a financer for your research.”

His dad chuckled, “No. Well yes, he does finance our work, but only because he’s the lead scientist of another very successful experiment. He thinks our project- you- has a lot of potential,”

“Ok, well how is he going to help?” Sehun pulled away a little, feeling slightly more composed, though roiling anxiety still lurked just a moment's provocation away.

“I’m not sure yet. I think he’ll probably contact the police, and handle that side of things. Media and that.” He shook his head. He'd never been very good at organisation, and Sehun guessed he inherited that from him.

More cars pulled up, including a police car, and people started filling up the area. A man and a woman approach them, and the woman pulled Sehun aside to ask him few questions, after introducing herself as Hanwoo Hwang, a police investigator. She asked him essentially the same questions his dad had, and then to see the phone, which she then put into a plastic bag, telling him she needed to log it as evidence, leaving Sehun aghast. He didn't want someone else to have anything of Tao's.

Once she had conferred with her partner and the other person in charge, she told them that they 'may go home now', and that they might come visit them at their home. Sehun scowled at her, how dare she just shoo them away like this! But Sehun's dad took him by the wrist and dragged him to his car anyway. Once home, Sehun holed himself up in his room, and hid under his quilt, wishing he'd made it down the stairs faster, or left the classroom earlier. Eventually he fell asleep to uncontrollable images of Tao being tortured by someone.

Sehun woke up to the sight of his mother shaking his shoulder roughly, urgently telling him to get up.He groaned and rolled over. Usually when he woke up, it took a while for him to orient himself. Not today; today he didn’t have to think about why he felt so exhausted, despite having slept a full eight hours according to the clock. The shock and panic of yesterday had left him tired.

“What?” He moaned at his mum. What could possibly be so important now? He scowls into his pillow. 

“We’ve had contact from the kidnappers. We thought you should come down and see.” 

Oh.

Without even bothering to change out of his pyjamas, Sehun almost fell down the stairs in his frantic hurry to get to his parents' laboratory. He pushed open the door, and found the room surprisingly crowded. Everyone seemed to be converging around one of his dad’s PCs. He recognised the two police officers from yesterday, the ones who had interviewed them, and Mr Evans with his floppy hair and thick glasses.

His dad turned around at the sound of the door, saw his son and motioned for him to join them. Sehun weaved around the other people to crouch next to his dad by the computer. They both looked at each other, betraying the worry they both felt. Sehun bit his lip then nodded his head at the screen, indicating for his dad to play the video. He pressed a button on the keyboard, and a video started.

It was of Tao, sat on a bed, glaring ferociously at someone to the side of the camera. Unintentionally, Sehun let out an enraged breath, his heart clenching at the sight of him. At least he didn’t seem hurt, but he looked sweaty and rumpled. 

He glared at this person mutinously for a few moments before his eyes flicked somewhere else in the room. He was reading something above the camera, Sehun realised. Tao looked back at the person before reading aloud, in a voice that that sounded far too shaky and scared to be coming from his angry face.

“As you know by now I have been taken,” he rolled his eyes, and Sehun felt a twisted surge of pride for him, “In order for me to be r-returned safely,”

There was the sound of paper being shuffled; they must have been changing the cue cards for him. His face contorted into an expression of disgust, and he read the next line bitterly, hands clenched so tightly on his lap that his knuckles were white,

poor taooo and poor sehunnnn awww

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